A Feast for Crows by George R. R. Martin

• Born: September 20, 1948
• Birthplace: Bayonne, New Jersey

First published: 2005

Type of work: Novel

Type of plot: Fantasy

Time of plot: Three hundred years after Aegon I’s conquest of the Seven Kingdoms

Locales: The fictional continents of Westeros and Essos

Principal Characters

Arya Stark, an assassin in training

Sansa Stark, her sister

Cersei Lannister, mother of King Tommen

Jaime Lannister, her twin brother and lover

Brienne of Tarth, a warrior

Asha Greyjoy, the daughter of the deceased king of the Iron Islands

Victarion Greyjoy, her uncle

Aeron Greyjoy, her uncle

Arianne Martell, a princess of Dorne

Arys Oakheart, her lover, a knight

Areo Hotah, captain of the guard for House Martell

Samwell Tarly, a member of the Night’s Watch

The Story

Following the murder of King Joffrey Baratheon of the Seven Kingdoms, a realm on the continent of Westeros, his younger brother, Tommen, has taken the throne. Although legally the heir of deceased king Robert Baratheon, Tommen is secretly the child of Robert’s wife, Cersei Lannister, and her twin brother, Jaime. Now that Tywin Lannister is dead, Cersei takes over as queen regent. She offers her uncle Kevan Lannister the position of Hand of the King, but he declines to take it unless she returns to Casterly Rock as its lady and makes him regent in her stead. She refuses his counteroffer and installs her allies on the king’s council of advisers; she also makes a series of bad decisions including allowing a new High Septon, the realm’s highest religious leader, to restore a religious order called the Faith Militant, despite the order’s antimonarchical history. The Lannisters had arranged for Tommen to marry Margaery Tyrell, the daughter of a wealthy ally who had married Joffrey just before his death. Suspicious that the Tyrells are attempting to gain more power and fearing that Margaery is not a suitable wife for her son, Cersei spreads the story that Margaery is not a virgin. After arresting Margaery and interrogating her supposed illicit lover, however, the new High Septon learns of Cersei’s alleged crimes and arrests her as well. Cersei’s uncle Kevan Lannister takes over as Tommen’s regent and chief adviser. While Cersei is imprisoned, she writes to her twin, Jaime, to ask him to be her champion in a trial by combat; he burns her letters and does not respond to her pleas.

Jaime attempts to end the siege at the castle Riverrun, which is held by the Tully family and besieged by forces loyal to the Lannisters and to House Frey. As the Lannisters and the Freys were responsible for the murder of Catelyn Stark, née Tully, and her son Robb, the Tullys are disinclined to negotiate with them, but Jaime eventually convinces the castle’s lord to surrender. Jaime had previously been held captive by Catelyn and was released in exchange for the safe return of her daughters, Sansa and Arya. Because he was unable to locate the girls and return them to their mother before her death, he tasked the warrior woman Brienne of Tarth with finding them and taking them to their remaining relatives. Brienne travels throughout the countryside looking for the Stark girls and is eventually captured by a band of warriors working with Catelyn, who has been magically resurrected and seeks revenge against those who harmed her family, particularly Jaime, whom she blames for her son’s murder. Catelyn and her comrades threaten to kill Brienne and her traveling companions unless she kills Jaime.

Meanwhile, Sansa is living at the Eyrie, a fortress that formerly belonged to her now-deceased aunt Lysa. Disguised as nobleman Petyr Baelish’s illegitimate daughter, Sansa learns of Petyr’s plot to gain power and help Sansa claim the North, which is her family’s ancestral domain. Arya, who is Sansa’s sister, is in the Free City of Braavos where she trains with a society of assassins called the Faceless Men and works to rid herself of her former identity.

After the death of Balon Greyjoy, leader and self-proclaimed king of the Iron Islands, the islanders gather to decide who will succeed him since his son and heir, Theon, is being held captive elsewhere. Balon’s daughter, Asha, vies for the throne as do her uncles Victarion and Euron. Euron is named king, and Asha and her uncle Aeron, a priest, separately leave the islands in protest. Euron sends Victarion to Essos on his behalf, tasking him with locating Daenerys Targaryen, the daughter of Aerys Targaryen who was king of the Seven Kingdoms and was deposed by Robert Baratheon nearly two decades before. Euron intends to marry Daenerys, who has been conquering cities in the east with the aid of her growing army and her three young dragons.

In the North, Jon Snow, lord commander of the Night’s Watch and illegitimate half-brother of the Stark children, sends his friend Samwell Tarly and several companions to the city of Oldtown where they are to research the Others, a race of frightening creatures that live north of the Seven Kingdoms. Sam and his companions travel to Oldtown by way of Braavos where they are stranded for a time. Sam unknowingly encounters Arya in Braavos and also learns of Daenerys’s activities in Essos. He and his companions later make their way to Oldtown.

In the semiautonomous southern region of Dorne, the Martell family learns that Oberyn Martell, brother of Prince Doran Martell, was killed while fighting the warrior Gregor Clegane who had killed their sister Elia years before. To prevent Oberyn’s daughters, known as the Sand Snakes, from trying to avenge their father, Doran sends his captain of the guard, Areo Hotah, to arrest them. Princess Myrcella Baratheon, King Tommen’s older sister, is being fostered in Dorne, and Doran’s daughter, Arianne, plots to crown Myrcella queen of the Seven Kingdoms in accordance with the Dornish law of succession. However, her plan goes awry: Myrcella is injured, Arianne’s lover and coconspirator Arys Oakheart is killed, and Doran has Arianne imprisoned. Doran eventually reveals that he has been working toward restoring the Targaryens to power for years and has sent his son Quentyn to Essos, where he will search for Daenerys and propose marriage to her.

Bibliography

Frankel, Valerie Estelle. Winter Is Coming: Symbols and Hidden Meanings in A Game of Thrones. New York: Thought Catalog, 2013. Digital file.

Goertz, Sharon Dee. "Mothers and Monsters: The Return of the Great Goddess in George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire." Myth in the Modern World: Essays on Intersections with Ideology and Culture. Eds. David Whitt and John Perlich. Jefferson: McFarland, 2014. 102–22. Print.

Jacoby, Henry, ed. Game of Thrones and Philosophy: Logic Cuts Deeper than Swords. Hoboken: Wiley, 2012. Print.

Lowder, James, ed. Beyond the Wall: Exploring George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire, from A Game of Thrones to A Dance with Dragons. Dallas: BenBella, 2012. Print.